Margaret Mee

British botanical artist whose expeditions documented endangered Amazon flora and raised conservation awareness.

Margaret Mee (1909–1988) combined art and activism to protect the Amazon rainforest. Over 32 years, she undertook 15 expeditions into Brazil's jungles, creating botanical illustrations of rare plants like the moonflower (Selenicereus wittii), which blooms nocturnally once a year.

Her detailed sketches, published in 《Margaret Mee's Amazon》, became critical records of biodiversity threatened by deforestation. Mee leveraged her art to lobby against destructive policies, even confronting Brazil's president in 1988 about highway projects endangering indigenous lands.

A passionate environmentalist, she collected plant samples for Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and mentored local conservationists. Her diaries, posthumously released as In Search of Flowers of the Amazon Forests, reveal her relentless spirit. Mee's legacy lives on through grants for botanical artists and her role in inspiring modern Amazon conservation initiatives.